School Sport: Nottingham home provides excellent table manners

QUESTION: Name the registered children's home in Nottingham which is producing British sporting champions of the future? Believe it or not, it's the English Table Tennis Association National Academy.

Now in its fourth year, it remains one of the least-publicised centres of excellence in British sport. Lottery-funded (at least until December 2002), it is a hidden gem, a place where gifted young players receive not only an education but also table tennis training and tournament experience abroad.

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Dionne, Darius's mother, says she sees more of her son now at weekends than when he lived at home. "I never saw him. He trained every evening after school and was never home before nine in the evening. Darius breathes, eats, and I'm sure he even dreams table tennis. I had to let him go, because this is such an opportunity for him."

His rival, Paul, is no different, though his elder brother Bryn, 16, also attends the academy.

The children's home (registered for child safety requirements) is run by Reg and Pauline Rockhall, both pensioners. Reg once ran a thriving table tennis club in Harringey, north London, and was awarded a Lottery grant of £1.37 million for the club, though the project fell apart when the local borough council were unable to provide financial support.

Here in Nottingham, the couple ferry the children to Dane Court, a local comprehensive school, every morning, and return them to the centre at 3pm. Then, after squash and toast, they have two hours of training, often with the country's top players. Every evening, tutors from Dane Court School provide additional two hours of teaching, which enables academy players to leave school one week in every four for intensive table tennis instruction.

It is a regimented lifestyle, supplemented with trips to Nottingham Forest Football Club, the local ice rink, and, as Darius and Paul are soon to discover, wider horizons, with competitions abroad. Next month the pair will visit Sweden to compete against senior players for the first time.

The cherry on the cake will come in March, when the pair visit China for a month's training with Jia Yia Liu, a chinese coach who has been helping to coach young English players since 1995.

Jill Parker, the academy's administrator and European women's champion in 1976, believes that the present crop will develop into a cadet force to rival any country in Europe. She explained: "Our club structure around the country is not strong enough for the best players and we need this centre. When Desmond Douglas was playing we used to have training camps once a month at Lilleshall, and you had to arrange practice yourself.

"Our students are all thriving in this set-up, and succeeding at school. Our newest pupils, Darius and Paul, are very talented. They're rubbing shoulders with the best players in England, the likes of Matthew Syed, and it's wonderful for them.

"Paul and Darius are only tiny tots, but they'll get their first taste of playing against men in Sweden next month. It will be their first real challenge."

Congratulations once again to Amy Spencer, the 16-year-old sprinter from Bolton School who received the BBC's Young Sports Personality of the Year Award in 2001, for breaking numerous records outdoors.

Last weekend Spencer was at it again, this time indoors at the National Indoor Arena in Birmingham, when she broke the UK under-17 and under-20 record for 200 metres with a time of 23.44sec.

It underlines Spencer's huge potential and puts her in the frame for a possible senior team place for the European Indoor Championships in Vienna in March. However, Spencer's coach, her father Graham, indicated last night that even if his daughter was offered a place in the team she may turn it down because it could interfere with her plans for the outdoor season.